Grantham. Car parking. Anger. Why we wont be shopping in Grantham in the future.

A couple of weeks ago Sharon parked in a South Kesteven District Council car park. She paid her money and put the ticket on the dashboard of her car. Unfortunately it was a blustery day and a gust of wind blew the ticket onto the front seat of the car. She didn't notice this so when she returned she found she had been given a £50 fine. She contacted the relevant office and sent in her ticket with an explanation of what had happened. They did not let her off the fine, however.The ticket wasn't displayed clearly according to regulations. She still had to pay the fine.

Naturally we were not pleased. We could have taken our appeal further but decided not to. This was because we have learned from long experience that getting involved in this kind of process  eats
 up your time and when you are self employed time is money. So we have paid the fine. The man in the office has won and no doubt he is pleased with himself for grabbing some cash for the South Kesteven coffers. Parking fines are such a convenient source of revenue!

Off course this business has a knock on effect that is not so beneficial to those coffers. Because we are angry -what did Sharon call them *%~** & **@**?- we are deterred from going into Grantham to shop now and certainly will not be using the South Kesteven Car Parks. They will be getting no more revenue from us so they are going to lose a lot more than £50 in revenue.

I'm not just talking about this because of our personal anger but because our experience is rather too common. Negotiating the one way system in Grantham is not easy and parking is difficult. Grantham used to have a bustling town centre and a wonderful market. Sadly there are few independent shops there now and the market is a sad remnant of what it used to be. I would like Grantham to be a thriving market town again that would be a joy to walk around. But it is unlikely to prosper unless The Council start making us feel welcome rather than making us feel like criminals or undesirable guests who are, in effect, being taxed to visit.

 And, of course, this story is being repeated in towns up and own the country, in towns that used to be called 'market towns' because people used to go to them to shop.